ASSOCIATE SPOTLIGHT SERIES: AN INTERVIEW WITH MORGAN LUND

In our Associate Spotlight series, we are highlighting associates across the company who are shaping our community and who embody our Life at Centric philosophy every day.

Meet Morgan Lund, Senior Buyer and Planner, Off-White and Avirex, based in New York City. 

Her Journey to Centric

Morgan’s path started at FIT, and with internships at Seventeen Magazine, Oscar de la Renta and Barneys New York that gave her a firsthand look at the fashion industry from several different angles. Those experiences sparked a passion for buying, and after graduation, she landed her first full-time role as a Merchandising Assistant at Moda Operandi. There, she worked with some of the top brands in the industry, learning the ins and outs of an ecommerce business and managing buying appointments. Over her four years at Moda Operandi, she was promoted to Assistant Buyer, taking on the Denim and Eveningwear categories.

Ready to build her brick-and-mortar experience, Morgan moved to Saks as an Associate Buyer, working on buys for both Saks.com and its physical stores in the Men’s department. It was a formative stretch that reinforced a philosophy she still holds today:

“I think the best thing you can do as a buyer is to be open to working for different departments, different business models, etc. The more product categories you have experience with, the better buyer you’ll be.”

That mindset carried her to Centric Brands, where she started as Buyer for Herve Leger. The shift from buying across 30-plus brands to focusing on a single business gave her a deeper understanding of how design, production, sales and planning come together to create the product customers see on the sales floor. Morgan was promoted to Senior Buyer last year, and she’s now preparing for her next move: Senior Buyer and Planner for Off-White and Avirex. She’s excited to dive into planning and grateful for the chance to keep growing within the company.

Leadership Lessons and Mentorship

Last year, Morgan took part in Centric’s Foundations of Leadership program, a multi-week series of in-person sessions led by Tim Headley (Vice President, Talent Development & Learning), Katie Peterson (Human Resources Associate) and facilitator Latoya Small. The program covered everything from helping direct reports grow in their career and understanding different learning styles, to navigating difficult conversations. Morgan credits it with meaningfully shaping her management skills, lessons she still applies today. She recommends it to any manager, whether new to the role or years into it.

Morgan also points to Sharmini Pardo (Planning Director, Herve Leger) and Melissa Lefere-Cobb (Senior Vice President, Division Head, Hervé Léger) as key figures in her development at Centric. Both have consistently encouraged her to pursue new opportunities, including her upcoming role with Off-White and Avirex.

A Career Highlight

One of Morgan’s proudest moments came in February of this year, with the launch of Herve Leger’s 40th Anniversary collection, a capsule of styles recreating iconic dresses worn by celebrities like Kim Kardashian, Rihanna and Lindsay Lohan in the ’90s and early 2000s. The launch was a strong success, driving multiple reorders since. For Morgan, the most rewarding part was seeing how every team member, from design to fit to marketing, contributed to bringing the collection to life and watching customers respond so positively to that collective effort.

Morgan worked closely with the Bloomingdale’s team to set up 21 pop-ups across their stores, including doors that didn’t previously carry the brand. She traveled to California to train Bloomingdale’s sales associates on the collection firsthand, an experience she describes as one of the most exciting of her career so far. The brand continues to build on that momentum with similar styles at similar opening price points.

Inside the Life of a Buyer

As Senior Buyer for Herve Leger, Morgan’s process for each season begins well before market. She starts by reviewing the prior year’s performance, identifying wins to replicate and patterns in slower sellers to avoid. From there, she digs into SKU productivity to determine how many styles per class the season needs and at what price points they’ll perform best, then sits in on proto reviews with the design team to offer style feedback.

Once the collection is in market, Morgan manages the buy for the brand’s ecommerce site, its six Bloomingdale’s partner shops, and its outlet, evaluating performance and capacity by store to determine style counts, unit quantities and sizing breakdowns. After launch, she tracks performance closely, chasing reorders on bestsellers and partnering with the ecommerce team on strategies like email features or early markdowns for slower sellers. She also manages the markdown and promotional calendar and outlet transfer cadence, among other ongoing projects.

What energizes her most is the product itself, and the relationships that come with it. Morgan particularly enjoys her conversations with Bloomingdale’s brand managers, whose passion and knowledge for the brand, along with their on-the-ground customer feedback, keep her connected to how the product performs in the real world.

Life Beyond the Buy

Outside of work, Morgan has lived on the Upper East Side since 2021 and has fully embraced the neighborhood. In 2024, she and her friend Maggi launched an Upper East Side Instagram page as a fun after-work project. Though still small, the page has let them explore local restaurants, workout studios, salons and more, while connecting with business owners across the neighborhood. For anyone looking for Upper East Side recommendations, her page (@ues_xoxo) is the place to check.